"Nothing whatever to me, darling. Don't be silly," he said tenderly. "It's only father's nonsense. He thinks so much of his name because it's a fossilised old concern which has been in the county since Noah. He doesn't want me to marry you, only because he's afraid your people may not have lived about here since Noah. If you went and told him you're a Raleigh or a Cruwys he would lay his pedigree at your feet and ask you to roll on it."
"Not well-born. No name," said Boodles, aloud this time. "I think we have been silly babies. I seem to have grown up all at once. Oh, Aubrey, was it you and I who used to walk here—years ago?"
He bent and took her face between his hands and kissed the pretty head.
"We never bothered about names," sobbed Boodles.
"We are not bothering now—at least I'm not. It's all the same to me, darling."
"It's not. It can't be. How silly I was not to see it before. If your parents say I'm not—not your equal, you mustn't love me any more. You must go away and forget me. But what am I to do? I can't forget you," she said. "It's not like living in a town, where you see people always passing—living as I do, on the moor, alone with a poor old man who imagines horrors."
"Listen, darling." Aubrey was only a boy, and he was nearly crying too. "I'm not going to give you up. I'll tell you the whole truth. My people wanted me not to see you again, but I shall tell them that things have gone too far with us. They won't like it at first, but they must get to like it. I shall write to you every week while I am away, and when I come back I shall tell father we must be married."
"I wouldn't, not without his consent. I shall go on loving you because I cannot help it, but I won't marry you unless he tells me I may."
"Well, I will make him," said Aubrey. "I know how to appeal to him. I shall tell him I have loved you ever since you were a child, and we were promised to each other then, and we have renewed the promise nearly every year since."
"Then he will say you were wicked to make love to the first little red-headed girl you could find, and he will call me names for encouraging you, and then the whole world will explode, and there will be nothing left but lumps of rock and little bits of me," said Boodles, mopping her eyes with his handkerchief. She was getting more cheerful. She knew that Aubrey loved her, and as for her name perhaps it was not such a bad one after all. At all events it was not yet time for the big explosion. "I'm only crying because you are going away," she declared, and this time she decided she meant it. "What a joke it would be if I turned out something great. I would go to Mr. Bellamie and ask him for his pedigree, and turn up my nose when I saw it, and say I was very sorry, but I must really look for something better than his son, though he has got a girl's face and is much prettier than I am. Oh, Aubrey," she cried, with a sudden new passion. "You have always meant it? You will be true to your little maid of the radiant head? I don't doubt you, but love is another of the queer puzzles, all flaming one time, all dead another, and only a little white dust to show for all the flame. The dust may mean a burnt-out heart, and I think that is what would happen if you gave me up."
He satisfied her in the usual way, declaring that if they ever were separated it would be by her action, not by his. She would have to unfasten the lover's knot. Then they went on. It was getting late, and the short day was already in the dimsies. They stood beside the gate, saying good-bye, not in two words, but in the old method which never grows musty. They passed on, the gate slammed, and they were outside; only just outside, but already they were lost and could not have found their way back; for the wand of the magician had been waved over "our walk," and fairyland had gone away like smoke to the place where babies come from.
Weevil was sitting in the dark, mumbling and moaning, when Boodles came in. He was in the seventh Hell of misery, as he had been for a walk and discovered beneath a hedge a rusty iron trap with its jaws fastened upon the leg of a rabbit. The creature had been caught days before, as decomposition had set in, and as it was only just held by one leg it must have suffered considerably. Such a sight is quite one of the common objects of the country, therefore Weevil ought not to have been perturbed; only in his case familiarity failed to breed indifference. He sat down in the dark, and as soon as the child entered began to quaver his usual grievance: "What right have they to make me suffer? Why may I not go a walk without being tortured? What right have the brutes to torment me so?"
"Groaning and grunting again, poor old man," said Boodles cheerfully, rather glad there was no light, as she did not want him to see she had been crying. "You must laugh and be funny now, please, for I've come home dreadful tired, and if you go on worrying I shall begin to groan and grunt too. I'm ready to have my boots taken off."
"Don't talk like that. Your throat sounds all lumpy," the old man complained, getting up and groping towards her in the dark. "What have you been doing—quarrelling?"
Boodles made noises which were intended to express ridicule, and then said miserably: "Saying good-bye."
Weevil knelt upon the carpet and began to unlace the first boot he could find, groaning and grunting again like a professional mourner.
"Did it hurt, Boodle-oodle?" he asked tenderly.
"Horrid," she sighed.
"It made you cry?"
"Ees."
"That was the Brute, darling. I've warned you of him so often. He doesn't let any of us escape. He shows me rabbits in traps, and he makes you cry. I believe you are crying now."
"Not much, daddy. Only a few little tears that were late for the big weep," said Boodles, burrowing her face into a cool cushion.
"I want you to laugh. You don't laugh so much now," he complained, drawing the boot off carefully, and then feeling inside to make sure that the foot had not come away too.
"One day you said I laughed too much, and I wasn't to do it any more," said a doleful voice.
"Ah, but there was a reason for that," said the old man cunningly. "I thought the Brute would be angry if he saw you laughing so much. That was before I took him by the throat and flung him out of the house. He hasn't been here since—not to worry you anyhow," he chuckled.
"You must explain that, please, and a lot of other things besides," she said hurriedly, sitting up and trying to locate the exact position of his head.
Old Weevil laughed in a silly sort of way. "It's a little personal matter between the Brute and me," he chuckled.
"But I come in. I'm the respondent, or whatever you call it. Now I must hear all about it," she said.
"You're not old enough. I shan't tell you anything until you are twenty-one."
"Yes, you will. I'm not a baby now. I am eighteen, and I feel more—nearly eighty-one to-night. I've got one boot on still, and if you won't answer I'll kick."
The old man jumped playfully upon the threatening foot like a kitten upon a ball of wool.
"Daddy-man, I'm serious. I'm not laughing a bit. I believe there is another cry coming on, and that will make you groan and grunt dreadful. Is it true you are my grandfather?"
The question was out with a rush, and murmuring: "There, I've done it," Boodles put her face back into the cushion, breathing as quickly as any agitated maid who has just received an unexpected offer of marriage.
Whatever Weevil was doing she could not think. He appeared to be scrabbling about the floor, playing with her foot. Both of them were glad it was so dark.
"Who told you that?" he said.
"Aubrey. You told his father. Why haven't you ever told me?"
"Boodle-oodle," he quavered, "let me take your other boot off."
"The boot can wait. Don't be unkind, daddy," she pleaded. "I've been worried dreadful to-day. Why did you tell Mr. Bellamie you are my grandfather, if you're not?"
"I am," cried old Weevil. "Of course I am. I have been your grandfather for a long time, ever since you were born, but I wasn't going to tell you until you were twenty-one."
"Why not? Why ever shouldn't I know? Are you ashamed of me?"
At that the old man began to throw himself about and make horrible faces in the dark.
"I expect you are," Boodles went on. "Mr. Bellamie is ashamed of me. He says I'm not well-born, and I have no name. Aubrey told me this afternoon."
"The liar," cried old Weevil. Then he began to cackle in his own grotesque way. He couldn't help being amused at the idea that he should be calling Mr. Bellamie a liar. "How did he know? How did he find that out?" he muttered. "Nobody could have told him. He must have guessed it."
"You are my grandfather," Boodles murmured. "Now you must tell me all about my father and mother. I've got to let Mr. Bellamie know," she went on innocently.
"I told him. I told him the whole story," cried Weevil. "He sat in this room for an hour, and I gave him the whole history. What a forgetful man he must be. I will write it out and send it him."
"Tell me," said Boodles. "How could you say that you picked me up on your doorstep, and never knew where I had come from?"
"It's a long story, my darling. I don't fancy I can remember it now." The old man wondered where he had put that precious piece of paper.
"Don't squeeze my foot so. Who was my mother? Do you really know who my mother was?"
"Tita, we called her that for short, Katherine, Mary—no, that's you. I've got it all written down somewhere. I must tell her the same story. Shall I light the lamp and find it?"
"You must remember. Are you my mother's father?" she asked impatiently.
"Wait a moment, Boodle-oodle. These sudden questions confuse me so. Mr. Bellamie would know. I told him. Yes, it was your mother. Miss Lascelles was her name, and I married her in Switzerland. We stayed at that hotel where Gubbings wrote his history of the world, and we fell out of a boat on Lake Geneva, and she was never heard of again."
"Where was I?" cried Boodles, knowing that impatience would only perplex him more.
"You were not born, darling. It was a long time after that when you were born, and your father was Canon Lascelles of Hendon."
"Dear old man, don't be so agitated," she said, putting out a hand to stroke his whiskers. "You are so puzzled you don't know what you are saying. How could my mother be drowned before I was born?"
"No, no, darling, you misunderstand me. It was my wife who disappeared mysteriously, not your mother."
"My mother was your daughter. That's one thing I want to know," said perplexed Boodles.
"Tita, we called her Tita for short," he said, glad of one fact of which he was certain.
"And my father, Canon Lascelles—really? A real canon, a man with a sort of title?" she cried, with a little joyous gasp.
"He's in British Honduras. I think that was the place—"
"Alive! My father alive!" cried Boodles. "And you never told me before! Why haven't I seen him? Why doesn't he write to me? Oh, I think you have been cruel to me, telling me those wild stories of how I came to you, keeping the truth from me all these years."
Old Weevil sat at her feet, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. He was protecting Boodles, giving her happiness, he thought; but when he heard that cry it suggested to him that his false story might bring her in the end more sorrow than the truth. He could not go back now that he had gone so far. A lie is a rapid breeder of lies; and old Weevil, with his lack of memory, and natural instinct for the truth, was a man singularly ill-fitted for fictions. He had overlooked a great many things in his wild desire to make the child happy. It had never occurred to him that she would feel a natural love for her parents.
"I wanted to be kind to you, Boodles," he quavered. "I kept the truth from you because there were good reasons."
"What were they?"
"I can't tell you, darling," he answered truly. "You must not ask me," he said firmly, because she had touched upon a mystery which his inventive faculties were quite incapable of solving.
"And my mother—where is she?"
"Oh, she is dead," said Weevil cheerfully. He was not going to have any trouble with the mother, and he was sorry he had not killed the father too. "I told you she was drowned mysteriously."
"That was your wife, my grandmother. You are not playing with me? You are not deceiving me?" said Boodles pitifully.
"I'm trying to tell you, only it is all mixed up. It happened so long ago, and the Brute has worried me so much since that I don't seem able to remember anything very clearly. Your mother went out of the hotel one day, and never came back."
"Where?"
"Lausanne, the hotel where—"
"But she may be alive still," interrupted the child.
"Oh no, darling. Quite impossible. She was never heard of again, and it was nearly thirty years ago."
"Don't ramble. You are wandering off again. How could it be thirty years ago, when I'm only just eighteen?"
Weevil admitted the difficulty, and replied that he had been thinking just then of his wife. She would keep mixing herself up with the girl's mother.
"Now I'm getting at it," said Boodles, with a kind of fierce seriousness. "My mother is supposed to be dead. My father is in British Honduras—"
"British Guiana," corrected Weevil.
"Are you sure?"
"Almost certain. I looked it up on the map. I wish I had that piece of paper," the poor old man muttered.
"Well, it does not matter much for the present. You say my mother was Miss Lascelles, and my father was Canon Lascelles; but if my mother was your daughter her name would have been Weevil."
"So it was, my dear," he cried, with a new inspiration, "at least it would have been if—if—I mean, darling, my name is really Lascelles, only I changed it to Weevil when I lost my fortune."
"Why ever couldn't you have told me all this before? How is it that Canon Lascelles had the same name as you? Was he a relation?"
"Yes, darling, first cousin," he faltered, wondering if the story resembled that which he had told to Mr. Bellamie.
"So my name is really Lascelles?"
"Titania Lascelles. But there are a lot of others. I was nearly forgetting them. You have a whole string of names, but I can't remember them now, except Katherine and Mary—ah, yes, and there was Fitzalan. I never could understand why they called you Fitzalan. I've got them all written down somewhere, and I'll read them to you presently. We called you Tita after your mother, but I got into the way of calling you Boodles, which means beautiful, and have never got out of it."
"You told all this to Mr. Bellamie?" asked Boodles excitedly.
"I think so. I tried to," said Weevil hopefully.
"Then what does he mean by saying I am of low birth and have no name?" she cried indignantly.
"Perhaps he did not understand. Perhaps he hadn't grasped it. I tell a story very badly, dear."
That point could not be disputed, and the child seized upon it eagerly. There was no telling what wild rambling statements her grandfather might have poured into the ears of Aubrey's father. But she could tell him now she was quite a well-born little dame, and had a splendid name which was all her own, and she was really good enough for Aubrey after all. She put her head back upon the cushion and began to laugh because she was happy, the day was ending nicely, and she believed the story would end nicely too. She had cried because Aubrey was going away and for no other reason; at one time that afternoon she had not been sure of it, she had almost been afraid that the tears had been brought on by Mr. Bellamie's evil suggestions about her birth; but now she knew that she could hold up her nose with the best of them. She was accustomed to Weevil's eccentric language, his contradictions gave her no suspicions; she swallowed the rambling story whole and wanted more. There were so many questions to be asked and answered. She thought she would write to Aubrey and sign herself Titania Lascelles with great flourishes.
"I am glad to hear you laughing, Boodles," said Weevil tenderly.
The poor old man was far from the laughing mood. He was indeed getting frightened at what he had done, and was wondering how he could carry it on, and how the story would end. Left to himself he would not have told the child anything; but she had caught him in an unguarded moment with a direct question, and he had been forced to answer without time to prepare himself by another rehearsal in private. He had hardly expected her to take things so seriously, forgetting how much the story meant to her, so utterly obsessed was his mind with the one great idea, which was her preservation from the Brute. Love blinds every one. The young it dazzles, like the sun low down on the horizon, so that they see no faults. Into the eyes of the old it flings dust to prevent them from seeing the end of the road.
"Now we must light the lamp and have supper," he said drearily, gently removing the child's other boot and pressing her warm little foot in his cold loving hand.
"I don't want lamps or suppers," she sighed. "What is that light, over in the corner?"
"I think it is the moon shining in between the curtains."
"The wind has got up. It's howling. I don't care, for I've got a name. I'm not Boodles Blank any more. I'm tired and happy."
"I have given you a little happiness. Boodles?" he quavered.
"Heavensfull. You have always been a funny old daddy-man, and now that you are my grand-daddy-man you are funnier than ever. Fancy keeping me in the dark all the time! To-morrow you must tell me everything. What was my mother like? Go on. Tell me a lot about my mother."
"I don't know, Boodles—I mean I can't think to-night."
Weevil had left her, and was tumbling about the room, knocking himself against things and groaning. He was beginning to understand that his efforts to destroy the Brute might only end by investing him with new powers. But the child was happy, and that was everything; she was singing to herself, and laughing, and thinking of her mother; not the mother who had tied her up in fern and flung her at his door, but the mother who existed only in his fantastic brain. Suppose Mr. Bellamie had found it out. But that was impossible, for nobody knew except that unknown mother and himself. He was doing what was right. His little maid was perfectly happy then. Sufficient for that day was the happiness thereof. There was just one trouble remaining—the problem of Mr. Bellamie's incredulity. Why had he not accepted the story which she was so ready to believe? Eccentric manner and contradictory statements did not explain everything. Mr. Bellamie had no right to put the whole story aside just because it had been badly told.
"I can tell you, Boodles. I have just found it out," he cried out of the darkness with a miserable sort of triumph. "There has been a lot of scandal about you, which I have never troubled to answer, and Mr. Bellamie has heard it, and finds it easier to believe than what I told him. There is the Brute again. He makes people prefer scandal to the truth. Nobody knows how you came to me, and so they invented a story to suit them. Everybody knows that story, and as I have not denied it Mr. Bellamie believes it is true. I think I'll write to him to-morrow."
"How did I come to you?" asked Boodles.
"It's a long story," he faltered. "I can't tell you now because I am feeling so tired. I shall have to think about it all night," he muttered.
"Why did you make up that queer story about finding me one night at your door?"
"That is true. Your father chose that way of sending you to me," he said lamely. "I kept the truth from you because I was afraid you might not want to stay with me if you knew everything. Your father wished you to be kept in ignorance. I was going to tell you on your twenty-first birthday."
"You needn't have told me you thought I was a poor woman's child," she said reproachfully.
"I am very sorry, darling. I won't do it again," the poor old creature promised.
Boodles jumped up, pattered to the window, and flung aside the curtains. The room was flooded at once with moonlight, and she could feel the wind coming through the chinks. Weevil looked up patiently, and she saw his weary old eyes and wrinkled face, ghastly in that light. It struck her he was looking very worn and ill.
"You are dreadful tired," she said very tenderly.
"Yes, Boodles, the noise of the wind makes me feel very tired."
"I am not Boodles now. That was my baby-name. I am Tita. And the others—Katherine, Mary—what are the rest?"
"I don't know, dear. I will try and think to-morrow."
"I won't tease you, but there is so much I want to know. Poor great big old grand-daddy-man, you look quite dead."
He shuffled towards her, put his arms round her, and began to make noises as if he was in pain. "I am tired and weak. That is all, darling, and the rabbit in the trap made me sick. I am weak and old and very tired, and I know I have done no good in my life. Shut it out, my maid—shut it out."
It was the prospect which he wanted shut out. They could see the bare stretch of moor, upon it the moon shining, and over it the wind rushing. There is nothing more dreary than a windy moonlit night upon the moor, filled with its own emptiness of sound, suggestive of wild motion and yet motionless, covered with light that is not light.
"It is like a lonely life," said Weevil bitterly.
Boodles dropped the curtains and tried to laugh. She did not like the look on the old man's face.
"The lonely life has gone," she said. "Now we will have some light."
Weevil shuffled after her, muttering to himself: "You have done it, Abel-Cain. You must keep it up. You must hold the Brute off her somehow, or she may have to go out, into the windy moonlight, into the lonely life."
One of the creeping-things to be crushed at the forthcoming Assizes was Brightly. Ju had been already stamped out of existence, and it was meet and right that the little man should follow her example, and be placed behind some stone walls where it would be impossible for him to drag lusty farmers from their horses and half-murder them for the sake of their clothes. Brightly had not long to wait in prison. Exeter put on the full panoply of the law during the first week of November; scarlet and gold were flourished; trumpeters and a special preacher brayed; bells clanged, the small grocer and the candle-maker were summoned to serve on the jury, to fail not at their peril, lawyers buzzed everywhere, and a lot of money was spent just because Brightly and a few poor yokels had misconducted themselves. It was a curious sort of net, this Assize net; it was constructed and cast in such a manner that it permitted a lot of coarse fish and golden carp to escape through its meshes, while all the little tadpoles and mud-grubbers were caught and held.
One of the coarse fish to swim into the judicial circuit was Pendoggat. He came to Exeter, partly that he might spend a portion of the capital of the Nickel Mining Company, and partly that he might visit the Guildhall to see sinners punished. Pendoggat had a keen sense of justice and a certain amount of dull humour. The Assizes represented to him a foreshadowing of the fiery pleasures of Hell—they were a pleasure to his mind because he was secure from them—and it amused him to think that another man was going to suffer for his wrongdoing. The idea that he was a sinner had never occurred to him. He had stripped Chegwidden, and flung him into the furze, because the wind had swept upon him, urging him to persecute the unconscious man, and he had obeyed. He had not robbed Chegwidden, nor had he stolen his clothes; and that was the principal charge against Brightly. If he had stood up in court, and confessed that he had dragged the farmer from his horse and stolen his clothes, he would have been telling a lie, which would have been painful to him. Brightly was not charged with finding Chegwidden unconscious, stripping the clothes from him, and throwing them down a wheal. Had that been the charge against him Pendoggat would probably have recognised that the purveyor of rabbit-skins was a good Christian, who had learnt the great principles of the gospel, and was willing to sacrifice himself for another. The mind of Pendoggat when it turned towards theology became incomprehensible.
The weather was changing into winter and there was a smell of snow upon the moor. Pendoggat had played his game, and so far as he could see had won it. The success was not brilliant, because the people of Bromley had proved to be a stingy set, and the amount of money subscribed for the mining venture did not reach three hundred pounds. The chairman of the company, Pezzack's retired grocer-uncle, who had after repeated failures at last discovered how to spell the word committee, was continually writing to know when the first consignment of ore was to be placed on the market, and, what was of far greater importance, when the first dividend might be expected. Pendoggat as frequently replied, through the agency of Pezzack, that operations could not be commenced until spring, as the climate of Dartmoor was not the same as that of Bromley; but the grocer could not understand, and went on writing. He appeared to think that nickel was like the inferior American and disreputable margarine—which in his business had been labelled respectively prime Cheddar and best butter—and would not keep. The little grocer deserved to lose his money, though he was eminently respectable. His position proved it, as only men of assured respectability can make enough money to retire and purchase a little suburban villa, with such modern improvements as walls one brick thick, roofs of thin plaster, and defective drainage. His front doorstep was whitened daily. His parlour window was heavily curtained, and in it were geraniums and ferns further to attest respectability; and behind the curtains and floral display was a chamber crowded with stately furniture. All was very beautiful in front, and very dirty behind. The display in front was for the benefit of the road. The negligence and dirt behind were only visible from the railway. It was best butter according to the parlour window, and disreputable margarine judging by the testimony of the back-yard.
Queer objects of the country had come from all parts of Devon to assert their intelligence as witnesses in the various trials. Peter was a witness in the Brightly case, Peter who had comforted his system with many a pint of beer, paid for with Chegwidden's money, and was then enjoying himself at the expense of the country, although he had taken the opportunity to get his railway fare from Mary. Peter was not only travelling again, but he was principal witness, as he had discovered Chegwidden lying unconscious and fully dressed upon the road; and Peter did not underestimate his importance.
Brightly had not been fortunate of late, but luck was to turn his way a little at the trial. No doubt sentences upon small prisoners depend very much upon the state of his lordship's liver. A bottle of corked wine, or a burnt soup, may quite possibly mean another couple of months to the man in the dock. Mercy is supposed to have its lodging somewhere in the bowels, and if they are out of order, or offended by inferior cookery, mercy may conceivably be out of order too. The judge upon this occasion was in a robust state of health. His wine had not been corked, nor had his soup been burnt, and he was quite in the mood to temper the panoply of the law with a playful kind of mercy which presented counsel with several somewhat obsolete jokes and one new pun. When Brightly appeared another pun was instantly forthcoming upon his name. His lordship had at once a kindly feeling for the prisoner who had contributed towards the maintenance of his own reputation as a humorist; and he was soon saying that it was absurd to suppose that such a poor creature could be guilty of robbery with violence against the person of a strong man like Farmer Chegwidden.
A very able young barrister defended Brightly at the request of the judge, a youngster recently called, who had every inducement to do his best. That was Brightly's second bit of luck. The health of the judge was perfect, and he had been allotted a strong advocate, although he could not understand why the gentleman took such an interest in him and tried so hard to get him off. The fat constable and the other witnesses were given a melancholy time by the young barrister, who treated them all very much as Pendoggat had treated Chegwidden. He stripped the lies off them and left them shivering in the strangeness of the truth. Peter was a difficult witness at first, but after a few minutes counsel could probably have made him swear that when he had discovered Chegwidden the farmer was undressing himself with a view to taking a bath.
"In what condition was he when you found him lying upon the road?" asked counsel.
"Mazed," replied Peter. "Same as I be," he muttered.
"Was he drunk?"
"No," said Peter stoutly.
"Do you know a drunken man when you see one?"
Peter thought he did, but was not certain. They were common objects, and as long as a man could proceed from one place to another, and shout occasionally, he was, according to Peter, a fairly sober person.
"Do you suppose he had fallen from his horse and stunned himself?"
"Likely," said Peter. "He'm a cruel hard rider."
"You have often seen him galloping over the moor, in what some people might call a reckless way?"
"Seen 'en often," said Peter.
"Thursday evenings usually?" went on counsel, in a pleasant conversational manner.
Peter agreed that it was so.
"You know, of course, that it is the farmer's habit on these evenings to frequent some public-house; one night at Lydford, another at Brentor, and so on? There's nothing remarkable about that, but still you are well aware of it?"
Peter was.
"And you know what he goes there for? Everybody knows that. You know why you go to a public-house. You go to get beer, don't you?"
"I du," said Peter with some enthusiasm.
"Sometimes there is a glass too much, and you are not quite sure of the way home. That's only human nature. We all have our little failings. When you have that glass too much you might ride 'cruel hard,' as you express it, over the moor, without caring whether you had a spill or not. Probably you would have a tumble. Chegwidden comes off pretty often, I believe?"
"More often that he used to du," mumbled Peter, not in the least knowing where he was being led.
"Well, that's natural enough. He's getting older and less confident. Perhaps he drinks a bit harder too. A man can hardly find it easy to gallop over the rough moor when he is very drunk. Don't you feel surprised that Chegwidden has never hurt himself badly?"
Peter was not flustered then. Counsel was half-sitting on the edge of the table, talking so nicely that Peter began to regard him as an old friend, and thought he would like to drink a few glasses with this pleasant gentleman who, he fancied, had a distinctly convivial eye. "'Tis just witchery," he said in a confidential manner, feeling he was in some bar-room, and the judge might be the landlord about to draw the beer. "He'm got a little charm to his watch-chain, and that makes 'en fall easy like."
"I suppose he hadn't got it on that night?"
"Forgot 'en, likely," said Peter with some regret, knowing that had Chegwidden been wearing the charm and chain he would have gained possession of them.
Counsel smiled at Peter, and the witness grinned back, with a feeling that he was adding to his acquaintances. The next question followed quite naturally—
"I suppose Chegwidden was pretty far gone that night. Now I want you to use your memory, and tell me if you have ever seen him more drunk than he was that night?"
"When us gets drunk us comes to a stop like," said Peter thoughtfully. "Us gets no drunker," he explained to his new friend.
"You think Farmer Chegwidden had reached that stage? He could hardly have been more intoxicated than he was when you found him?"
Peter admitted that the farmer's condition was unquestionably as his friend had stated.
"He was dead drunk?"
"Mucky drunk," said Peter with a burst of confidence.
"You were not astonished, as you know he is an habitual drunkard?"
Peter was just going to agree, when he remembered he didn't know the meaning of the word habitual.
"He gets drunk frequently. Makes a habit of it," explained counsel.
"He du," said Peter, in the emphatic manner which makes for good evidence.
"Why did you say just now he was not drunk when you found him?" asked counsel smoothly.
Peter's eyes were opened, and he discovered he was not in a bar-room, but in the Guildhall between rows of unsympathetic faces, and his nice young companion was not a friend at all; and he knew also he had been giving evidence against a parishioner. It was useless after that to proceed with the charge against Brightly in its original form; and his advocate then attempted to show that he was equally innocent of theft.
Here, however, he failed, and his lordship himself, who felt in the mood to be merciful, could only point out that circumstantial evidence went entirely against the prisoner. He didn't believe that Brightly, was a bad character. A long experience upon the Bench had enabled him to determine fairly accurately between the hardened criminal and the poor man who succumbed to sudden temptation. It was a wild cold night, and the prisoner in his wretched clothes had happened to pass that way, and when he found the drunken and stunned farmer lying upon the road the temptation to strip him of his clothing had been too strong. The subsequent ill-treatment of the senseless man, no doubt to gratify some old grudge, was the unpleasant feature of the case. It was not altogether easy for him to believe that Brightly had worked single-handed. He left the case to the small grocer and the candle-maker with every confidence that they would bring in a verdict in accordance with the evidence, and he hoped that their consciences would direct them aright. The consciences did their work rapidly, Brightly was declared guilty, and the learned judge found that he would not be doing his duty to the country if he sentenced him to less than three months' imprisonment with hard labour. The next case was called, and the police began as usual to complain about the sentence, and to declare that it was no use doing their duty when judges wouldn't do theirs. The prisoner was removed weeping, asking the gentlemen if they wouldn't let him have his little dog, and begging the warder to take his "duppence" and go out to buy him some rat-poison.
Brightly had indulged in several fits of play-acting since his committal. He was a dull-witted man, and they could not make him comprehend that he was a criminal of a particularly dangerous type, and his little Ju a furious beast which it had been found necessary to destroy. He was, indeed, so foolish that he failed to grasp the fact that Ju was dead. He was always asking if he mightn't have her to talk to. When they brought him food he would set a portion aside for Ju, and beg the warder to see that she got it. When he sang his hymns he put out his hand and patted the floor, thinking it was Ju. He did not want to go to the wonderful dairy without his little dog. She would like the milk and honey too. He would never have the heart to drive about in the pony-cart, which was sure to come some day if he only waited long enough, unless Ju was squatting upon the fern at the bottom or on the seat beside him. It would be dreary Dartmoor indeed without tail-wagging starving Ju. They could not make him understand that Ju was starving no longer. Since his committal Brightly had failed to benefit from the food, which was the best he had ever eaten in his life, though it was prison fare. He was thinner because he could not feed upon the air and the solitude, or smell the moor, and he was more blind because the healing touch of the sun was off his eyes. He often thought of an evening how beautifully the sun would be shining across Sourton Down, and he wondered if the gentlemen would let him go, just to get a feel of it for a few minutes. Sometimes he thought he could hear the Tavy roaring, but it was nothing but the prison van rumbling in.
After sentence Brightly became more foolish, and rambled about his little dog worse than ever. The doctor certified he was totally incapable of undergoing hard labour, and he was removed to the infirmary, where kind people visited him and gave him tracts and hoped he would see the wickedness of his ways before it was too late. At last Brightly began to comprehend that he was a vagabond of the baser sort. All the gentlemen had said so, and they would not have impressed it upon him so frequently if it was untrue. It appeared that he had led a life of vice from his earliest years. It had been wicked to walk about the moor trading in rabbit-skins, and vile to live in a cave upon Belstone Cleave; and he had never known it until then. There was so much that he didn't know. He learnt a lot about literature in his confinement. A lady read portions of the Bible to him, and Brightly found some of it interesting, although he could not understand why the Hebrew gentlemen were always fighting, and his teacher didn't seem able to explain it. Another lady tried to teach him "Jerusalem the Golden," and he responded as well as he could, but the words would not remain in his poor memory, and he always gave a quaint rendering of his own when he tried to repeat the lines. He had the same question for every one: might he have his little dog and talk to her for a bit? At last the doctor made him understand that Ju was dead, and after that Brightly changed. His soul became rusty, as it were, and he did not respond to his teachers. He accepted everything with the same patient spirit, but he showed indifference. He became like a tortoise, and when people stroked his shell he refused to put his head out. It was all owing to the same old fault—he could not understand things. He comprehended that he was a criminal, and it had been fully explained to him that criminals must be kept in confinement because they constitute a danger to other people. But he could not understand what Ju had done that she should be taken away from him and killed. Apparently she too had been a criminal, and much worse than himself; for he had only been sent to prison, while she had been executed. That was what Brightly couldn't understand; but then he was only a fool.
Pendoggat left the court after sentence upon Brightly had been pronounced, and began his homeward journey. The trial had pleased him, and satisfied his sense of justice. He was hurrying back because there was a service that evening and he was going to preach. Brightly would make a good subject for his sermon, the man who was alone because he was not fit to dwell with his kind, the man who had been caught in his sins and punished for them. He had always tried to impress his listeners with the fact that every man is sure to suffer for his sins some day; and he believed what he said, and could not understand why people were so dull as to think they would escape. Pendoggat had discovered long ago that every man regards his neighbours as sinners and himself as a saint. He behaved in exactly the same way himself. He would not be punished, because he always made a point of repenting of his sins. He saved himself by prayer and chapel attendances, and every day would insure his soul against fire by reading the Bible. And yet he thought himself different from other people, and was amazed when they had the effrontery to declare that they too were saved, although neighbour This and neighbour That ought to have known they were most assuredly and everlastingly damned.
The region of the Tavy was cold and clear; a great change from the low-lying city on the Exe and Greedy where there had been mist and drizzle. As Pendoggat rode up from Lydford he noticed white pools and splashes upon the dark tower and roof of St. Michael's church upon its mount, and his heart warmed at the cold sight. It was to him what the note of the cuckoo is to many, a promise, not of spring, but of the wild days when solitude increases and the bogs become blue glaciers. Winter had come and there would soon be the usual November fall of snow. Pendoggat prepared his discourse as he rode up. The night was coming when no man could work, miners least of all. His was not a cold theology by any means. It contained, indeed, little that was not red-hot. The old-fashioned lake of fire, surrounded by attendants in a uniform of tails and hoofs, armed with pitchforks to keep sinners sizzling and turn them occasionally, was good enough for him. Every one would have to be burnt some time, like the gorse in swaling-time, except himself.
Ebenezer was crowded that evening. The week-day services were popular, especially in winter, when the evenings were long, and there was no money for the inn. Chapel upon the moor occupies much the same place in the affections of the parishioners as the music-hall has obtained over the minds of dwellers in big towns; and for much the same reason, everybody likes to be entertained, and praying and hymn-singing are essentially dramatic performances. A warm church or chapel is an attractive place on a winter's evening, when it is dull at home, and there is nothing doing outside. Middle-aged men will always speak lovingly of their village church and its pleasant evening services. They do not remember much about the prayers and hymns; but they have a very clear and tender recollection of the golden-haired girl who used to sit in the next pew but one.
Pezzack did not come in until Pendoggat had finished his discourse. He was a sort of missionary, carrying the gospel over many villages, and his unfortunate habit of tumbling from his bicycle kept many a congregation waiting. He entered at last, with a bruised nose and tender ear, and took possession of the reading-desk which his friend and partner had been keeping warm for him; and then in his usual ridiculous fashion he undid Pendoggat's good work by preaching of a pleasant land on the other side of this world of woe. Eli had always been an optimist, and now that he was happily married his lack of a proper religious pessimism became more strongly marked than ever. He would never make a really popular minister while he insisted upon looking at the bright side of things. Many of his listeners thought him frivolous when he spoke of happiness after death. They couldn't think wherever he got his strange ideas from. It seemed as if Pezzack wanted to deprive them of that glowing hell which they had learnt to love at their mother's knee.
The congregation melted away quickly to the echo of Eli's blessing, and the friends found themselves alone, to put out the lamps, lock the chapel, and leave everything in order. The minister was elated; they had enjoyed a "blessed hour;" the world was going very well just then; and he longed to clasp Pendoggat by the hand and tell him what a good and generous man he was. He stood near the door, and with the enthusiasm of a minor prophet exclaimed: "'Ow beautiful is this place, Mr. Pendoggat!"
A more hideous interior could hardly have been conceived, only the minister was fortunate enough to know nothing about art. Temples of Nonconformity on Dartmoor, as elsewhere, do not conform to any recognised style of architecture, unless it be that of the wooden made-in-Germany Noah's Ark; but Pezzack was able to regard the wet walls and dreary benches through rose-tinted spectacles; or perhaps his bruised eye lent a kind of glamour to the scene. It was certain, however, that Pezzack had never yet seen men or things accurately. He regarded Pendoggat as a saint, and the chapel as a place of beauty. His eyes were apparently of as little use to him as his judgment. A blind man might have discovered more with his finger-tips.
"You'll never make a preacher, man," said Pendoggat, as the last light went out. "I'd got them worked up, and then you come and let them down again. Your preaching don't bring them to the sinner's bench. It makes them sit tight and think they are saved."
"I can't talk about 'ell. It don't come to me natural," said Eli in his simple fashion.
"Sinners ain't saved by kindness. We've got to scare them. If you don't flog a biting horse he'll bite again. You're too soft with them. You want to get manly."
"I endeavour to do my duty," said Eli fervently. "But I can't talk to them rough when I feel so 'appy."
"Happy, are ye?" muttered Pendoggat, his eyes upon the ground.
"My 'appiness is beyond words. I get up 'appy, and I go to bed 'appy, and I eat 'appy. It's 'eaven on earth, Mr. Pendoggat, and when a man's so 'appy he can't talk about 'ell. I owe it all to you, Mr. Pendoggat."
"The happiness or hell?" said Pendoggat, with a flash of grim humour.
"The wonderful and beautiful 'appiness. My wife and I pray for you every night and morning. We are very comfortable in our little cottage, and when, Mr. Pendoggat," he went on with enthusiasm, "when God sends our first little olive-branch we shall 'ave all that our 'earts can desire. Ah, Mr. Pendoggat, you don't know what a blessed thing it is to be a father."
"You don't either," said the other sharply.
"I feel it coming upon me. I feel the pride and the glory and the honour of it swelling up in my 'eart and making me 'appy with the world and all that therein is. Amen. I can see myself walking about with it, saying: 'Open your eyes, my dear, and look at the proud and 'appy father of your being.' 'Ow beautiful it all is, Mr. Pendoggat!"
Pezzack spoke like a fool. Why such men should swell with pride when they become putative or actual parents is one of the wonders of the universe. Gratification is permissible enough, but not a sense of pride, which implies they have done something marvellous. Pezzack was like a hen cackling because she has laid an egg, and supposing she has accomplished something which entitles her to a chief place among hens, when she has only performed an ordinary function of Nature which she could not possibly have prevented.
"You're too soft," muttered Pendoggat, as they turned away from the gloomy box-shaped chapel and began to ascend the silent road. It was a clear night, the stars were large, and the wind was cold enough to convey the idea of heat. There was enough light for them to see the white track crossed ahead by another narrow road cut out of the black moor. By morning there would be a greyness upon everything, and the heather would be covered with frosted gossamers.
Pezzack was blowing on his big red hands, and stumbling about as if he had been Farmer Chegwidden. He had never learnt how to walk, and it was getting late to learn. Pendoggat was carrying a huge black Bible, which was almost as cumbersome as Mary's umbrella. He always took it to chapel with him, because it was useful to shake at the doubters and weaker vessels. Big books in sombre bindings generally terrify the young or illiterate, whatever their contents; and a big Bible brandished at a reading-desk suggests a sort of court of appeal to which the preacher is ready to carry his hearers' difficulties.
"I think we are going to get some snow," said Eli, falling back naturally upon the state of the weather.
"There is a bit on Brentor," said Pendoggat.
"Then there will be some on Ger Tor. I must take my wife out to-morrow to look at it. She does not know Dartmoor. It will be a little pleasure for her."
The Pezzacks were easily amused. The first sprinkle of snow on Ger Tor was worth going out to see, and could be discussed during the long evening.
"It will mean the closing of the mine. There must be a lot of water in it," suggested Eli in a nervous manner, although he was anticipating things rather, seeing that the precious mine had never been opened.
"Afraid you won't get your fifteen shillings a week, are ye?" said Pendoggat, in what was for him a pleasant voice.
"I don't think of that," lied Eli, stumbling along, with his hands flapping like a pair of small wings. "I am in your 'ands, Mr. Pendoggat, so I am safe. But my uncle writes every week and sends me a mining-paper, and wants to know why we don't throw ourselves about a bit. I think he means by that we ought to be at work. My uncle talks slang, Mr. Pendoggat."
"Tell him he's a fool," said Pendoggat curtly.
"I 'ave," said Eli meekly. "At least I suggested it, but I think he misunderstood me. He says that if we don't make a start he will come down and make things 'um a bit. I am sorry my uncle uses such expressions. They use funny phrases in Bromley, Mr. Pendoggat."
"He can come down if he likes, and you can give him a pick and tell him to mine for himself until the commoners catch him," said Pendoggat pleasantly. "We've done with your uncle. He won't subscribe any more money, and I reckon his friends won't either. We've done our part. We've got the money, nothing like so much as we wanted, but still a good bit, and they can have the nickel, or what they think is nickel, and they can come here and work it till the Duchy asks them what they're after, or till the commoners fling them into the Tavy. Write that to your uncle," said Pendoggat, poking his victim in the ribs with his big Bible.
The minister stopped, but his companion went on, so he had to follow, stumbling after him very much as Brightly had followed upon that same road begging for his "duppence."
"What do you mean, Mr. Pendoggat? What do you mean?" he kept on saying.
"You're a happy man," muttered Pendoggat like a mocking bird. "Got a wife, hoping for a child, manager of a mining company, with a rich fool of an uncle. You're a lucky man, Pezzack."
"I'm a 'appy and fortunate man," gasped Eli.
"Every one respects you. They think you're a poor preacher, but they know you're honest. It's a fine thing to be honest. You'll be called to a town some day, and have a big congregation to sit under you if you keep honest."
"I 'ope so. You're walking so fast I don't seem able to keep up with you."
"It's a cold night. Come on, and get warm. How would you feel if people found out you weren't honest? I saw a man sentenced to-day—hard labour, for robbery. How would you feel if you were sentenced for robbery? Gives you a cold feeling, I reckon. Not much chance of a pulpit when you came out. Prison makes a man stink for the rest of his life."
"I can't keep up with you, Mr. Pendoggat, unless I run. I haven't enough breath," panted Eli.
Pendoggat put the Bible under his arm, turned, caught Eli by the wrist and strode on, dragging the clumsy minister after him.
"Mr. Pendoggat, I seem to think some'ow you don't 'ardly know what you are a-doing of." Pezzack was confused and becoming uncertain of grammar.
"You'd stand and freeze. Breathe this wind into you and walk like a man. What would you think, I'm asking ye, if you were found guilty of robbery and sent to prison? Tell me that."
"I can't think no'ow," sobbed Eli, trying to believe that his dear friend and brother had not gone mad.
"Can't think," growled Pendoggat. "See down under! That's where the mine is, your mine, Pezzack, your nickel mine."
"You are 'urting my arm, Mr. Pendoggat, my rheumatic arm. Don't go on so fast if you kindly please, for I don't seem able to do it. Yonder ain't my mine, Mr. Pendoggat. It's yours, but I called it mine because you told me to."
"Your uncle thinks it's yours. So do his friends. All the business has gone through you. What do they think of me? Who do they think I am?"
"Oh, Mr. Pendoggat, I told them you are the manager."
"Your man. Your paid servant. Does it pinch here, Pezzack? 'Tis a bit up here, and the moor's rough."
"Your 'and pinches, the good right 'and of fellowship," panted Eli.
"Don't the words pinch? Suppose the mine fails, where are you? Your uncle will be down on you, and he'll cast you over. You won't see any of his savings, and there's a wife to keep, and children coming, but you're a happy man. We're all happy on a frosty night like this. Come on!"
"What are you a-saying? I don't seem to get hold of it. Let me stop, Mr. Pendoggat. I want to wipe the sweat off my face."
"Let it bide there. My name don't appear in the mining business. The thing is yours from start to finish, and I'm your man. There will be none more against you if the mine fails, and I'm thrown out of a job. I've got the cash, Pezzack, every penny of it down to the Barton in notes. When are we going to start on the new chapel, minister? We're going to build a new chapel, the finest on the moor. We can't start till the spring. You told your uncle that? The snow's coming. It's in the air now, and I reckon 'tis falling thick on the high tors. We can't build the chapel and get out the nickel while the snow lasts."
Pendoggat was walking at a furious pace, devouring the keen wind, his head bent forward, chin upon his chest, lurching from side to side, dragging the minister like a parent hauling a refractory child.
"He 'ave lost his senses. He don't know what he's doing with me," Eli panted, becoming for the first time indirect.
"We're getting near the top. There will be a fine wind. Do you good, Pezzack. Make a man of you. What do you think of the nickel down under? Pretty good stuff, ain't it? Had it analysed yet? Found out what it's worth a ton? Got permission from the Duchy? I reckon you've done all that. You're a fine business man. You know a good sample of nickel when you see it."
"I left it all to you, Mr. Pendoggat. You know all about it."
Pezzack tried to say more, something about his feet and rheumatic arm and the perspiration which blinded him, but he had no more breath. Pendoggat's fingers were like a handcuff about his wrist.
"Suppose it ain't nickel at all. I never heard of any on Dartmoor. They'll be down on you, Pezzack, for the money, howling at ye like so many wolves, and if you can't pay there's prison. What are you going to say for yourself? You can't drag me into it. If I tell you there ain't a penn'orth of nickel down under you can't touch me. If you had proof against me you couldn't use it, for your own sake. You'd have to keep your mouth shut, for the sake of your wife and the family what's coming. It's a fine thing to have a wife, and a fine thing to be expecting a child, but it's a better thing to be sure of your position. It ain't wise to marry when you're in debt, and when you've got a wife, and are depending upon a man for your living, you can't make an enemy of that man. I reckon we're on top. Bide here a bit and rest yourself."
They were on the summit of one of the big rounded hills. The heather was stiff with frost and seemed to grate against their boots. The weather had changed completely while they had been coming up from the chapel. Already the stars were covered over with dense clouds which were dropping snowflakes. There was nothing in sight, and the only sound was the eternal roar of the Tavy in the distance. Helmen Barton was below. The house was invisible, but the smell of its peat fire ascended. Pendoggat was breathing noisily through his nose, while Pezzack stood before him utterly exhausted, his weak knees trembling and knocking against each other, and his mouth open like a dog.
"Why have you done this to me, Mr. Pendoggat?" he gasped at length.
"To make a man of you. If I have a puppy I make a dog out of him with a whip. When I get hold of a weak man I try to knock the weakness out of him."
"Was it because I didn't talk proper about 'ell?" sobbed the frightened minister.
"Come on," cried Pendoggat roughly. "Let's have a bout, man. It's a fine night for it. Put out your arms. I'll be the making of you yet. Here's to get your blood warm."
He raised his Bible and brought it down on Pezzack's head, crushing his hat in.
Eli stumbled aside, crying out: "Oh, Mr. Pendoggat, you don't know what you're doing. 'Itting me with the 'oly word. Let me go home, Mr. Pendoggat. My wife is waiting for me."
Pendoggat was too far gone to listen. He followed the wretched man, hitting at him with the big book, driving him along the top of the hill with resounding blows. Eli could not escape; he was unable to run, and he was dazed; he kept on stumbling and bleating, until another good blow on the head settled his business and sent him sprawling into the heather.
"Get up, man," shouted Pendoggat. "Get up and make a bout of it;" but Eli went on lying flat, sobbing and panting, and trying to pray for his persecutor.
"Get up, or I'll walk on ye with my nailed boots."
Eli shambled up slowly like some strange quadruped, found his awkward feet, and stood swaying and moaning before his tormentor, convinced that he was in the hands of a madman, and terribly afraid of losing his life. Pendoggat stood grim and silent, his head down, the Bible tucked reverently beneath his arm, the snow whitening his shoulders. It had become darker in the last few minutes, the clouds were pressing lower, and the sound of the Tavy was more distant than it had been.
"'Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest,'" quoted Pendoggat slowly. "'Tis a cheering text for a whist winter's night."
He had finished amusing himself, and now that he was cool again his mind reverted naturally to his religion.
Eli could not say anything. It was as much as he could do to stand upright. His clay-like right hand was pressed to his forehead. He was afraid he would fall down a great many times going home.
"Shake," said Pendoggat in a friendly way. "Give me the good right hand of fellowship, minister."
Eli heard him, comprehended the meaning of the words, and hesitated, partly from inability to act, and partly from unwillingness to respond. He felt he might fall down if he removed the hand from his dazed head. He smiled in a stupid fashion and managed to say: "You 'ave been cruel to me, Mr. Pendoggat. You 'ave used me like a beast."
Pendoggat stepped forward, caught the big cold hand in his, pulled it roughly from the minister's forehead, and shook it heartily. Not content with that, he dragged the poor dazed wretch nearer, threw an arm about his neck, and kissed him on the cheek. Perhaps it was the influence of his Spanish blood which suggested the act. Possibly it was a genuine wave of sorrow and repentance. He did not know himself; but the frightened Maggot only groaned and sobbed, and had no caresses to give in return.
"'How good and joyful a thing it is, brethren, to dwell together in unity,'" quoted Pendoggat, with the utmost reverence.
Mary soon forgave her brother for his failure over the electric light business, and they became as good friends as ever, except when Peter demanded sums of money for services which Mary could not remember he had rendered. Peter had a trick of benefiting himself, and charging the cost to his sister. They were settled for the winter; Peter had turfed up the chinks in the walls, adding a solid plaster of clay; had repaired the thatch of gorse where it had rotted, laying on big stones to prevent the removal of any portion by the gales; and had cut the winter supply of fern. He sent in the bill to Mary, and she had taken it to Master, and Master had put on silver spectacles and golden wisdom and revised the costs so thoroughly, that Peter had to complain he had not received the price of the tobacco smoked during the work of restoration.
Mary still mourned for Old Sal, knowing she would never see "the like o' he again," while Peter cooked his mommet and cursed Pendoggat. Peter was a weak little creature, who could only revenge himself by deeds of witchcraft. He was not muscular like his sister, who would have stood up to any man on Dartmoor, and made some of them sorry for themselves before she had done with them. Mary believed in witchcraft, because she was to a certain extent religious; she had been baptised, for instance, and that was an act of witchcraft pure and simple, as it was intended to protect the child from being overlooked by the devil; but, if any man had insulted her, she would not have made a mommet of him, or driven a nail into his footprint; she would have taken her stick, "as big as two spears and a dag," and whacked him well with it.
The prospect of winter encouraged Peter to turn his mind towards literary pursuits. There were days of storm and long evenings to be occupied; and the little savage considered he might fill those hours with work for which his talents seemed to qualify him, and possibly bequeath to posterity some abiding monument of his genius. Peter had a weekly paper and studied it well. He gathered from it that people still wrote books; apparently every one wrote thern, though only about one in every hundred was published. Most people had the manuscripts of their books put away in cupboards, linhays, and old teapots, waiting the favourable moment to bring them forth and astonish the world. This was something of a revelation to Peter. Where was his book! Why had he remained so long a mute inglorious scholar? Possibly the commoners who met him in daily intercourse had their books completed and stored away safely in their barns, and he was certainly as learned as any of them. Peter went off to Master, and opened to him the secret of his mind.
Master was entirely sympathetic. He gave it as his opinion that any one could write a book. When the art of forming letters of the alphabet had been acquired, nothing indeed remained, except pen, ink, and paper; and, as he reminded Peter, Mother Cobley sold ink at one penny the bottle, while pen and paper could be obtained from the same source for an additional twopence. Genius could therefore startle the world at threepence a head.
Peter was profoundly interested. He indicated the big tomes, which Master kept always lying beside him: a copy of theArcadia, a Bible dictionary, a volume of Shakespeare, and a few books of poetry, most of them presents from a former rector long deceased, and suggested that Master was accountable for the lot. The old man beamed through his spectacles, coughed uneasily, and generally assumed that attitude of modesty which is said to be one of the most marked traits of literary men.
"You can spell turnips," Master reminded.
"Sure 'nuff," said Peter. "I can spell harder words than he. I can spell hyacinth, and he'm a proper little brute."
He proceeded to spell the word, making only three mistakes. Master advised him to confine himself for the present to more simple language, and went on to ask what was the style and subject of Peter's proposed undertaking.
"I wants yew to tell me," was the answer.
Master had an idea that genius ought to be inspired from within and not from without, but he merely answered: "Nothing's no trouble, varmer," and suggested that Peter should compose a diary. "'Tis what a man does every day," he explained. "How he gets up, and how he goes to bed, and how he yets his dinner, and how his belly feels."
Peter considered that the idea was brilliant. Such an item as how he drank his beer would certainly prove entertaining, and might very well be original.
"Then he ses things about other volk, and about the weather," Master went on. "He puts down all he can think of, so long as it be decent. Mun't put down anything that bain't decent 'cause that would shock volks."
"Nothing 'bout Varmer Pendoggat and Chegwidden's maid?" the other suggested, in rather a disappointed voice.
"Hark ye, Peter," said Master decidedly, "you had best bide quiet about that. Volks wun't tak' your word against his, and if he purty nigh murders ye no one wun't try to stop 'en. A man bain't guilty till he be found out, and Varmer Pendoggat ain't been found out."
"He can't touch I. Mary wun't let 'en, and I've made a mommet of 'en tu," said the little man.
"Made a mommet, ha' ye? Aw, man, that be an awful thing to du. It be calling in the devil to work for ye, and the devil wun't work wi'out pay, man. He'll come sure 'nuff, and say to yew: 'I wants your soul, Peter. I've a bought 'en wi' that mommet what yew made.' I be main cruel sorry for yew, Peter."
"It be done now," said Peter gloomily.
Master wagged his head until his silver spectacles dropped off his nose, added a little wisdom, then returned to his subject.
"Yew mun write things what you wun't be ashamed to let folk read. When 'tis a wet day yew ses so, and when it be fine you ses it be butiful. When yew gets thoughts yew puts 'em all down."
"What du'ye mean?" asked the aspirant.
"Why, you think as how it be a proper feeling when you'm good, and yew ses so. That be a thought."
"S'pose yew bain't feeling good?" suggested Peter quite naturally.
"Then yew writes about what it feels like to be bad," explained Master. "Yew puts it down this sort o' way: 'I feels bad to-day. I don't mean I feels bad in my body, for that be purty middling, but I feels bad in my soul. It be a cruel pity, and I hopes as how I wun't feel so bad to-morrow.' All them be thoughts, Peter; and that be the way books are written."
"Thank ye kindly, master. It be proper easy," said Peter.
"You'm welcome, varmer. Nothing's no trouble."
Peter bought the articles necessary for fame, and went home. Mary was forking manure, pausing only to spit on her hands; but she stopped for another reason when Peter told her he was going to keep a diary.
"What be yew talking about?" she cried, amazed at such folly. "Us ha' got one as 'tis. What du us want wi' another?"
Peter had to explain that the business of his diary had nothing to do with such base commerce as cream and butter, but consisted in recording the actions of a blameless life upon a pennyworth of paper for the instruction and edification of those who should come after them. Mary grasped her fork, and told him he was mazed.
Peter was not sure that Mary had spoken falsely when he came to test his 'prentice hand. In theory the art of writing was so simple, and consisted in nothing more difficult than setting down what he would otherwise have spoken, adding those gems of thought with which his mind was occasionally enriched under the ennobling influence of moderate beer. But nothing appeared upon the sheet of paper except dirt. Even the simplest art requires practice. Not every man can milk a cow at the first attempt. After much labour he recorded the statement: "This be a buke, and when 'tis dun 'twill be a dairy. All volks write bukes, and it bain't easy till you'm yused to it." There he stopped for the day. As soon as he left the paper all sorts of ideas crowded into his mind, and he hurried back to put them down, but directly he took up the pen his mind was a blank again. The ideas had been swept away like butterflies on a windy day. Mary called him "a proper old vule," and her thought was probably quite as good as any that were likely to occur to him. "'Tis bravish times us lives in. Us mun keep up wi' em," was Peter's answer.
The next day he tried again, but the difficulties remained. Peter managed to place on record such imperishable facts as there was snow and more would come likely, and he had got up later than usual, and he and Mary were tolerably well, and the fare for the day was turnips and bacon—he wanted to drag in turnips because he could spell the word, and he added a note to inform posterity that he had taught Master how to do so—but nothing came in the way of thoughts, and without them Peter was persuaded his book could not properly be regarded as belonging to the best order of literature. At the end of his second day of creation Peter began to entertain a certain feeling of respect, if not of admiration, for those who made a living with the pen; but on the third day inspiration touched his brain, and he became a literary soul. The old gentleman who shared his house, so called out of courtesy, as it contained only one room, was making more noise than usual, as if the cold had got into his chest. The diarist kept looking up to peer at Grandfather's worn features, wondering what was wrong, and at last the great idea came to him. "Dalled if Gran'vaither bain't a telling to I," he exclaimed; and then he got up and went cautiously across the room, which was the same thing as going from one side of the house to the other, his boots rustling in the fern which covered the floor.
"Be'ye alright, Gran'vaither?" he asked, lapping the old fellow's chest with great respect. He was accustomed to chat with the clock, when alone, as another man higher in the scale of civilisation might have talked to his dog. Peter noticed that it was getting dark around him, although it was still early in the afternoon.
"I be cruel sick," a voice answered.
Peter cried out and began to shiver. He stared at the window, the panes of which were no longer white, but blue. Something was taking place outside, not a storm, as the moor was unusually silent, and there seemed to be no wind. Peter tried to collect his thoughts into a form suitable for publication. He shivered his way to the other side of the room and wrote laboriously: "Gran'vaither be telling to I. Ses he be cruel sick." Then he had another attack of shivers.
"Who was that a telling to I?" he shouted, the noise of his voice making him bolder.
"'Twas me," came the answer at once; and Peter gulped like a dying fish, but managed to put it down in the diary.
"Who be ye?" he called.
"Old Gran'vaither."